


Breaking Up in Three Easy Clichés

by Xparrot



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Break Up, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-05
Updated: 2008-09-05
Packaged: 2017-10-30 03:13:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/327145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xparrot/pseuds/Xparrot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's been planning this all day, but it wasn't supposed to start like this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breaking Up in Three Easy Clichés

**Author's Note:**

> This is less an actual fic and more me working to come to terms with the pairing, such as it is. Such as I see it, so I can move on and see Jennifer in her own right. Any McKeller OTPers will probably want to give this one a pass, for your own good. Spoilers for "The Last Man" and "The Shrine".

"Hey," Jennifer says, as Rodney barges into her office and drops into the chair across from her desk, already mid-rant about his day, the chemical spill in the lab and had they ever properly studied the medical effects of hydrochloric acid on the Ancient alloys, because there were certain substances released that—"Rodney," she interrupts, raising her hand, "we have to talk."

Then she winces, because she's been planning this all day—all week—and it wasn't supposed to start like this.

It stops Rodney cold, though, his mouth snapping shut, and he swallows hard enough to make his throat visibly pulse. The thing with clichés is that they're cliché for a reason. Because sometimes there's nothing else to say.

"Um," Rodney mumbles. "Yes. Um. Could we...wait? Until after dinner? Or another week or two? A month? Forever? Because—I can try, I will, whatever you want, I know I'm not always here, with missions and research and whatever, but I thought—"

"It's..." _Not like that_ , she wants to say, only of course it's exactly like that and damn it, she should have written out cue cards or something, because it wasn't supposed to go like this. Even though there was really no way around it, but the way his face is crumpling breaks her heart. She reaches out, takes one of his hands in one of hers—big and warm and she likes the softness of his palm, the calluses on his fingertips, already familiar. "I do love you, you know."

"Really?" His smile is tentative, confused, like she's never said it before; but the sun's out from behind the clouds in his eyes, and she has to smile back to see that. Rodney's not one of those guys who you have to wonder what he's thinking or feeling, ever, and she likes that about him. Enjoys how easily she can make him brighten with only a few words.

"Yeah," she says, but it's not enough, and Rodney might be emotionally oblivious but he's not stupid, he's never stupid. The clouds come back, and his thumb, stroking idly over her knuckles, stills. He slips his hand out from hers.

"But not like that," he says.

She wants to tell him he's wrong, that it's not what he thinks, that it's more complicated than that; but she doesn't want to lie, either. "No," she says, and almost apologizes. Because maybe this is her fault, leading him on, mistaking a crush for something more, mistaking friendship for romance, mistaking loneliness for desire.

Or maybe it's not her fault at all, because she's not the only one mistaken.

 _What's my favorite color,_ she wants to ask him; _what's the name of my first dog, where'd I meet my best friend?_

It's just details, it's nothing important; except it is. And she doesn't blame him, because she keeps forgetting the name of his cat—it wasn't Schrodinger, she'd remember that—and she still hasn't managed to stay awake through _Star Wars_.

It's nothing that matters, except that it does.

 _I love you_ , he said, and she should've erased that damn video months ago. She doesn't rewatch it, she hasn't since their first official date, their first kiss; but she remembers it, and smiles when she remembers it, and sometimes, remembering it, she wishes...

He was six days gone then, an astrophysicist blanking on the name of the galaxy he was living in, and his small, self-deprecating laugh as he struggled with that elementary recall isn't a sound she's heard out of him since. He's no more forgiving of his own faults than anyone else's, but he'd been kinder then, the edge of his frustration blunted. _Rodney_ had been blunted, his sharp mind and his sharp tongue alike.

He doesn't snap at her that much, mostly just when he's injured and in pain and he's not talking to his girlfriend but to his doctor, demanding if she's gotten all her beads and rattles certified, and he usually apologizes right afterwards. He doesn't say he's sorry to the scientists he berates in the labs, however, or for his sarcastic asides at staff meetings.

She tells herself she likes him better this way, likes him better as himself, acerbic and egotistical and brilliant. There's a part of her that dreams of being like that, of having that confidence. That wishes she cared less what people thought, especially when those people are _wrong_.

But there's a part of her, too, that thinks if tomorrow Rodney woke up with his IQ subtracted and his memory faulty and his genius faded, smiling that self-conscious smile as he shyly confessed his love, that she wouldn't mind. That she might not even notice what was missing, as long as she had him there, warm and telling her she was loved, needing her caring.

And she thinks, too, that if she woke tomorrow with a parasite eating her brain, tearing her mind apart bit by bit, that Marie would notice her lapses, that Teyla would ask if something were wrong, that Ronon would start watching her closely, before Rodney did.

She doesn't say any of this, but she's thinking it all when she asks him, "When did you realize you were in love with me?"

Rodney squirms, because while he's told her he loves her before, more than on that video, it's mostly been in bed, not sitting across from her and not even touching, forced to own up to emotion as a rational man, without the excuse of the afterglow. That his feelings are always on his face doesn't mean they come easily to his mouth—he is still a guy, after all.

But this is important enough to him that he straightens up, says, "When I realized we could have a future together."

"And how'd you realize that?" she presses.

Rodney's eyes widen in dismay. "Oh, no," he says, "oh, damn it—I'm sorry, shit, I am such an idiot. I'm sorry, I'm so bad at this—John told me not to tell you, he told me, but I thought—relationships are supposed to be about honesty, openness, whatever; but he _told_ me not to—"

John, of course John would have. John's smart, she thinks. Too damn smart, and he takes care of his team too well. She knows it's petty to call this his fault, but it feels good to place the blame on someone besides her or Rodney. It's a shame she's never been good at holding grudges, because she could get a spectacularly satisfying one out of this. But she knows she won't. John wasn't trying to hurt either of them; he probably thought he was helping.

Rodney's still talking, his pitch climbing almost to panic—"Jennifer, this isn't about that, that future never even happened, never will happen. It's just, it's what gave me the idea—no, that sounds wrong, it's not like I didn't—I always thought you were good-looking, and you're smart, and—I would've noticed you eventually. Probably. You know how I am, I just thought, I never thought you'd be interested, women like you never are—"

"Don't!" she snaps, and now she's angry. Which feels better than guilt, if only marginally. "Don't sell yourself short like that, Rodney, you're a good guy. You're a great guy, you're one in a million, and damn it, you know it, so stop using me to stroke your ego."

Rodney coughs. "One in a billion, technically," he mumbles. "If you're going strictly by IQ."

"I'm not," Jennifer says, pushing down the inevitable surge of resentment. Until she came to Atlantis, she was usually the smartest of anyone she knew, whatever else she could or couldn't do.

Rodney blinks. "Uh, you, too," he offers hastily. "I mean, you're no slouch in the brains department, and it's not like we can compare directly anyway, medicine is such a, um, a different science—"

"I'm not you," she says. Reminds herself for the thousandth time that this isn't a competition; that she graduated salutatorian in high school and it never bothered her, because her father always told her it wasn't about being the best, it was about being _your_ best, and she believes that, she sincerely does.

But scientifically she's not in Rodney's league, and he's never going to lie and pretend she is—not when he won't acknowledge even Sam Carter, or his sister, or Dr. Zelenka. She's always known this about him and it doesn't bother her. Except when it does.

On day six, she could've beaten him handily at chess or Trivial Pursuit, and it's thoughts like that that make her think she's a terrible excuse for a human being. She shoves them aside, looks at Rodney, staring at her hurt and wide-eyed.

He's awfully cute when he's vulnerable. That, at least, is too fundamentally true for her to feel guilty about it.

"You weren't interested in me until John told you we hooked up in an alternate timeline," Jennifer says, and then has to swallow a mean and borderline hysterical giggle, because while she's endured messy breakups before, she can honestly say that she never expected to say that particular sentence during one. Or any other time.

Rodney's way past seeing the humor, though; he's shaking his head, speaking almost too fast to be intelligible, "But, no, it wasn't like that, you'd already asked me out, I just, I thought it was a joke, or a pity date, thanks for saving your life, I didn't think it could be more, until—"

"It was," Jennifer says, and finds herself babbling back, at the flash of pain on Rodney's naked face. "Not a pity date, but I didn't—it was flirting. I like flirting. I liked you, you are a good guy, and you were feeling down about Katie. I wanted to make you feel better. And I had fun, but it wasn't—I didn't think it meant anything, and I...I liked that." He hadn't treated her any different, after that beer; hadn't asked her out again, even as he continued to come down to the infirmary for all manner of minor conditions, and she'd realized that what she had mistaken for awkward flirting had been something else. A childish need for attention, or simple hypochondria, or maybe he just needed a break from lab and fieldwork sometimes, and felt less guilty about it if he had a medical excuse.

And she'd been...relieved. A little disappointed, because there's always something flattering about thinking someone likes you, and all the more when it's one of the smartest men in two galaxies. But she hadn't come to Atlantis looking for a relationship; she didn't need the complication in her life, and besides, while Rodney was her type when it came to the IQ and the capable hands and the blue eyes, she'd dated guys enough like him to know it would get frustrating past the first few fun times, when the novelty wore off and the relationship started.

She'd been relieved, because in her head she'd already been running scenarios of how to let him down easy. Kicking herself because she shouldn't have made that overture, not when she had to work with Rodney—not when she did like him, when she thought he was funny and brave and fantastically smart, a good guy to know. When all she'd really wanted was a drink with a friend after a long, hard day.

Rodney is looking at her now, upset but also confused, brow folded up as he applies his genius to the equations of human relations, mathematics a hundred times more difficult than quantum mechanics. "So...you never—you were just trying to cheer me—"

"No," she cuts him off. "No, it wasn't like that. I thought—I thought. That I," and she twists her hands together, makes a net with her fingers, like she's trying to catch her confession as it leaves her mouth. "I wasn't leading you on. Not on purpose. I just—I thought there was something. I told myself there was something. I _wanted_ there to be."

"Oh." Rodney swallows again, and she thinks that maybe he's trying not to cry. It makes a lump in her own throat, prickles in her eyes.

It makes her want to take it all back, but that's not fair. Not to either of them. "You were the first guy," she says, "who told me you loved me first. Before I said it. And I thought that should be enough, but—maybe it would be, but you didn't mean it. Not like that."

 _I've loved you for some time now_ , he said on day six; but on day twelve he looked at her and said, _You're not Carson, what was your name, again?_ and by day fifteen he wouldn't look at her at all— _John, where's John?_ and _Ronon Dex!_ and _You're my sister_ ; but Jennifer was his doctor and nothing more.

She could tell herself it didn't mean anything, but it did.

Still, what he'd said to her had to mean something. When he'd first said it, she hadn't known what to say—how to answer a dying patient, whether a lie or honesty would be crueler. But he hadn't asked for an answer. And later she'd almost thought he'd forgotten it, had been glad he had. She'd been thankful that John could calm him as she couldn't, that she could research possible cures while Rodney's team took care of him, and he didn't miss her, didn't ask for her when she wasn't there.

But she kept rewatching the video, when she'd been working for hours, her eyes strained and her head aching, trying to save his life; she would bring Rodney up on her screen, still mostly himself, but subdued and self-conscious and painfully open, unbearably sincere. _"I love you_. _"_ And what are you supposed to say to that, but _"I love you, too"_?

He'd wanted to say it to someone before he died, because who doesn't want to be able to say that they love? And she'd wanted to hear it, because who doesn't want to hear that they are loved?

And maybe that's enough for some people, but it isn't for her. And not for him, either.

"There is something," she says, and she reaches out, takes his hand again before he can withdraw it. "Rodney, really. I'm not lying to make you feel better, I do care about you. I like hanging out with you, I'd miss you if you—I'd miss you. But. I love you, but..."

Rodney's lips pull into a sort-of smile. "It's not me, it's you."

"It's both of us," she shoots back.

Rodney opens his mouth. And closes it again, automatic protest dammed back. Fading away, as she looks at him steadily.

After a moment she lets go of his hand, says quietly, "We had a future together, yes. But the future that Colonel Sheppard saw—I don't ever want that future." And not only because she'd end up dead of an agonizing alien respiratory condition in less than a year. Though that part doesn't especially appeal, either.

"No," Rodney agrees, "of course not, but..."

But you were alone, she thinks. We were alone, the only ones back on Earth who remembered, and your team was gone, John and Teyla and Ronon, and Sam, and Atlantis, and Pegasus. And I'd failed, worse than I ever have in this life.

Rodney didn't tell her many details, not even as much as John told him, she suspects; but added to what facts were in Colonel Sheppard's official report of the incident, it's enough for her to picture that erased future. She can see Rodney, grieving and shattered; she can see herself, desperate to save someone after losing everything.

She thinks that she did love Rodney, that she would have, then. She cares about him now, and going through that together—it wasn't, wouldn't have been, a lie, whatever she'd had with him, before she'd died horribly (and no, it's still not a fun thought).

But it wasn't the whole truth. And here and now, it's not the truth at all. Maybe it could have been; maybe it still could be. But it's not what she's looking for, not what she wants now; and he doesn't, either.

Right now, she's happy with her job, happy with her place on Atlantis. She wants friends to grab a beer with, to watch the stars with, a shoulder to cry on when she needs it; she's not looking for someone to come home to. She doesn't want the noise of obligatory conversation filling up the peace of her quarters every evening, doesn't feel like arguing about the room temperature every night. She can still put off thinking about kids for another few years, and plans to. She likes what she has now.

And Rodney, she thinks, maybe is ready for a change, maybe does want someone waiting for him—unless he just misses his cat—but he doesn't want her. Not any more than he'd want anyone who told him they loved him, who told him they might have a future together. And he deserves better than that, deserves more than making do.

"So," Rodney says finally, when she can't find anything to say. He's trying to smile, but he can't fake it successfully, and he's looking at a point at the wall behind her head. "Um. So. 'Let's be friends,' right?"

"No." Jennifer shakes her head hard. "Or, yes, but—really, not just saying it. I want to be friends, really, but...if it's easier for you..." They'll have to work together, not much choice in that, but she doesn't have to tease him. If that's what she was doing before. She'll miss their conversations, but not enough to put him through suffering an unrequited crush.

But he stops trying to smile, meets her eyes. "No, I...I'd like that, Jennifer. Knowing you. Um, getting to know you. In the friend sense, not the biblical—not that that wasn't—um." He ducks his head, looks up at her through his absurdly long lashes, his ears going red. "It wasn't the, umm. The sex, it wasn't—"

Jennifer stops a laugh just in time, because she knows how sensitive guys can be. "The sex was great," she says, honestly.

"Really?" Rodney stammers. "I mean, um, you, you were great, obviously, but—"

"Really," she confirms.

"Oh. Well. That's," and that's his real smile, brief, but wide and pleased and spontaneous, the one he gets once in a while when he's doing his science, after a triumphant breakthrough.

She realizes, seeing that smile now, that she hasn't seen it in all the time that they've been dating, when Rodney's been so anxious to please her, trying to make a good impression. Trying to reach that future John told him about, instead of letting the present develop however.

She realizes, too, that she missed it, far more than she's going to miss dating him, however much she likes the feel of his hands.

"You should get to dinner," she says. "The team's probably already there."

"Ah. Yes." Rodney gets up, only to dither in front of her desk. "Umm. Maybe it's weird, but...if we actually are going to go for the friends goal—do you still want to come anyway?"

She should spare his feelings and refuse. Or maybe spare her own, because it will be awkward if he announces the break-up now; she knows what side his teammates will be obliged to take.

But it has to happen sometime. And she hasn't seen Teyla in a couple days and is missing her Torren time; and John hopefully might understand. And Ronon... "Sure," she says. "I'll meet you there in a few minutes, have to finish up a couple things here."

"All right, see you," and Rodney nods and starts for the office door.

Stops as they slide open, turns back. "This is—it's over, right? Us, we're. Just friends, after this, nothing else?"

Maybe it's the angle of the light, that she can't read his expression, can't tell if he's hopeful or depressed or wishful. Or content. "Yes," she says. "Friends."

"Okay," Rodney says, and leaves.

"Okay," Jennifer repeats, after the doors close behind him, and she's only a little surprised to discover that it really is.


End file.
